Making the City a Little Less Bad – A Study into the Motivation behind Urban Agriculture in Gothenburg

In just a few years more than half of the world’s population will live in urban city areas: with the growing populations of cities and the rising obstacles to agriculture in the form of climate change, water shortage and soil degradation, urban agriculture and horticulture projects might be part of a solution to the problem.The purpose of this study has been to investigate the different motivations demonstrated by gardeners at urban agriculture projects in Gothenburg: Can similar motivations be found amongst different gardeners, and is there a difference in motivation when growing food for commercial purposes instead of for self-sufficiency reasons? Through literature review and semi-structured interviews this study has found that the main motivations behind urban agriculture and horticulture can be divided into three main areas: i) ideological and political motivations, ii) vegetables and the activity of growing, and iii) social reasons. While different motivations are common for all informants of this study, the ideological and political motivations were found at a larger extent among the commercial gardeners.Uppsats för avläggande av filosofie kandidatexamen med huvudområdet kulturvård med inriktning mot trädgårdens hantverk 2021, 180 h